The following relates generally to wireless communication and more specifically to narrowband wireless communications cell search.
Wireless communications systems are widely deployed to provide various types of communication content such as voice, video, packet data, messaging, broadcast, and so on. These systems may be capable of supporting communication with multiple users by sharing the available system resources (e.g., time, frequency, and power). Examples of such multiple-access systems include code division multiple access (CDMA) systems, time division multiple access (TDMA) systems, frequency division multiple access (FDMA) systems, and orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) systems. A wireless multiple-access communications system may include a number of base stations, each simultaneously supporting communication for multiple communication devices, which may each be referred to as a user equipment (UE).
In some cases, a UE that is accessing a wireless network may attempt to determine information related to a timing offset, a frequency offset, or an identity of a cell using cell search or cell acquisition procedures. Cell acquisition procedures can be power-intensive relative to other operations a device may perform. That is, for some devices, including devices that operate in a narrowband portion of a larger bandwidth, cell search procedures may use a relatively large amount of the device's limited power supply. This may limit the useful life of the device or interfere with the capacity of the device to perform other useful functions.